Monthly Archives: September 2013

First things first… this is going to be in German. And I’m also still sewing, I’m just photo-lazy and had a couple of other things on my mind the past weeks. But I’ll try to post some sewing updates in the next two weeks, so please don’t give me up! 😉

I have to admit I nearly stopped reading the Harry Dresden Files because I started to get bored by the books. Lots of action scenes, wild chases and nearly impossible tasks but I missed the detective work from “Storm Front” and good story lines. But there were also these little hints that something bigger is going on and so I decided to give “Blood Rites” a try. And I’m really glad I did!

Contents:
Thomas Raith of the White Court vampires asks Harry to help a friend of him who thinks someone is trying to murder him or the women around him by curses. Harry agrees and assumes an undercover job in his buisness. Which is the production of pornographic movies 😀 While giving us lots of cause to laugh at this job he also meets two of Thomas’ half sisters and gains a lot of information about House Raith, the leaders of the White Court.
But since trouble never comes alone Harry discovers that Mavra of the Black Court is in town to get her revenge on him. And that she got herself some thralls to help her. Instead of waiting what she does Harry decides to make an offensive move against her with the help of some of his friends.

Conclusion:As mentioned above I’m glad I didn’t stop reading the Dresden Files and made myself start with “Blood Rites”. The beginning acutally is a lot like the last books, but once you made it to the middle, there are lots of unexpected twists and turns. And – at last! – more information about Harry’s mysterious mother and the rest of his family. Some other loose ends from the last books are picked up and I got the feeling that the Dresden Files are becoming a real series now.

While I already got the next six Dresden books on my Kindle I stopped myself from starting with “Dead Beat” right away. I don’t like reading books from one series one after another since I realized I miss the variety and therefore become annoyed regardless to the quality. And there are just so many other unread books…

Now, wait… does this mean I actually read a book by a German author in English? Well, yes it does. To be frank, it was just cheaper in English. Kind of sad, isn’t it? I mean where the hell goes all the money? Is the English version making profit at all? Anyway, there are fixed book prices in Germany, so maybe that’s got something to do with it. I feel like I’m rambling here but this bothers me a bit. Never mind. I just wanted to make it clear why I mostly read in English. I’m a student, I’m allowed to choose based on the price 😉

Okay, now let’s talk a little bit about “Inkdeath”. It’s the last book of a trilogy, the other ones are “Inkheart” and “Inkspell”. There’s also a movie based on “Inkheart” (which I actually saw!) so if you know the movie and are interested in how the story went on, you should stop reading here. Spoilers will come. But I can tell you upfront that the trilogy is definitely worth reading!

Contents:
It seems like everything has been getting worse since the ending of “Inkspell”. Ombra is controlled by the Adderheads wasteful brother-in-law called the Milksop, Orpheus reads treasures for himself and creatures to hunt for the Milksop to the Inkworld and the Adderhead is still alive and rules with an iron hand. But the White Book is indeed rotting and with it the Adderhead’s flesh rots on his skin making his live an unending agony. And so his hunt for the Bluejay becomes more intense every day.

Conclusion:
Remembering to get off the train while reading this was a real challenge! Cornelia Funke managed to write an enthralling book once again which still has this fantastic aura of nearly forgotten castles, giants, fairies and magic. But don’t think it’s a soft story, there’s also blackmail, hunts, death and terror going on. Overall the book was a true page-turner for me and maintained a healthy balance between tight situations and the more emotional scenes. There were also quite a few unforeseen twists in the story, making it thrilling and keeping me wondering to last chapters what would happen. The only litte annoying thing was the dominance of one character in the second half who always seemed to step in and save the day for some time. But I can live with that.

As you may have noticed I’m trying to get back to blogging a complete review for every book instead of the collective posts. Getting over my occasional blogging-laziness, ha!